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Tuesday, April 30, 2013

My family adores the classic piped butter cookies from European bakeries. Sadly, our local Swiss bakery closed its doors forever on Christmas Eve and we cannot enjoy our favourite European baked goodies from there anymore.

Making these light, crispy cookies has eluded me for YEARS. The batter was either too stiff for my hands to pipe from a pastry bag or I would get pools of shapeless blobs. I am recovering from carpal tunnel syndrome and tendonitis in my wrists, so my weak hands could not squeeze the tough cookie dough out of the pastry bag. I stopped trying. The other day, I stumbled across a "Whipped Shortbread" recipe. I have not tried whipping the dough for 10 minutes before piping and it required only 3 simple ingredients: butter, icing sugar and flour. Not the healthiest, but I really wanted to try this. I was not sure about whipping the cookie dough for 10 minutes with my powerful KitchenAid stand mixer. All over the net, this recipe appeared to be a classic, so I assumed that this was written for a hand mixer. I used my KitchenAid stand mixer and decreased the time to 5 minutes. I have only made this once with success and I hope the results are the same every time. Whipped ShortbreadCookiesmakes about 40 cookies1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour1/2 cup icing sugar (sift before measuring)1 cup softened butter- optional: pieces of glace cherries, chocolate chunks, etc. Preheat oven to 350F. Sift flour and sugar together and set aside.Beat softened butter with mixer until light and fluffy. Add dry ingredients gradually on low speed until well mixed then beat the dough for 5-10 minutes until light and fluffy. Spoon dough onto cookie sheets about 2 inches apart. If desired, pipe with a pastry bag and star tip in different shapes onto an ungreased cookie sheet. Optional: place a piece of cherry onto the middle of each cookie. Bake for 15 to 18 minutes or until edges are very lightly browned. Let cookies rest on the cookie sheet for a few minutes before placing them on a rack to cool. - Adapted from Whipped Shortbread Cookies and Allrecipes.com: Whipped Shortbread Cookies

My personal notes with the KitchenAid stand mixer:

I didn't use softened butter (too impatient), I diced up the cold butter into small pieces and beat it with the paddle attachment for 5 minutes.

After adding the flour/sugar mixture, mix for 2 minutes on low/medium to make dough. Change to the wire whisk attachment and whip the dough for 5 minutes, instead of 10. The dough will have a soft, fluffy, aerated texture that makes piping a breeze.

I piped about 1 1/2" sized cookies with the Wilton 1M tip

Decorated with glace cherry pieces and baked for 11-13 minutes until edges were lightly browned.

I always check the cookies about 5 minutes before the recipe says it is done. Every oven is different.

I was able to make about 60- 1 1/2" sized cookies from this batch.

Success! The whipped dough was effortless to pipe for my weak hands. I placed the dough in a disposable plastic piping bag with a Wilton 1M star tip. Again, I didn't get a chance to try them as I'm still gluten and dairy-free. Hubby and the kids told me that they were better than our local Swiss bakery's! What a way to make mommy's heart sing!

Thursday, April 11, 2013

I was digging around the freezer and found some frozen blueberries. Lately, I have been trying some new gluten-free, egg-free and dairy-free recipes, but I wanted to make something easy, tried and true... and also DELICIOUS! This is another classic recipe I should write down for the kiddies. I have been making these squares for over 5 years!

Blueberry crumb bars came to mind. I wasn't in the mood to make yummy blueberry muffins.

I must thank Allrecipes.com for the wonderful selection of recipes. What makes this website invaluable is the number of ratings and reviews for each recipe. Reading the reviews from people who have made this recipe makes a world of difference for those who wonder if the recipe is good. Looking at my binder full of printed recipes, I saw that it has been a while since I made Blueberry Crumb Bars. I have brought these to potlucks and social gatherings with requests for this recipe.

This recipe is very easy to put together. I decreased the sugar and used butter instead of shortening. The butter makes them smell scrumptious while baking!

Make the dough with a pastry blender and pat half of the crumbly flour mixture into a 9x13 greased pan. Lightly pat the crust and smooth it evenly with the back of a tablespoon.

Next, spread the blueberry/sugar/cornstarch mixture evenly on top of the dough.

Spoon the remaining dough evenly over the berry layer and pop in preheated oven.

Bake in 375F oven for about 45 minutes or until top is slightly browned.

The combination of butter, juicy blueberries and crunchy crust makes this an addictive square. They may not look fancy but after one bite, you will want to reach for another one!

To make them prettier, I dusted the blueberry bars with powdered/icing/confectioners' sugar. Nessa brought these squares to her class for Snack Day with some strawberries and carrot cake. She told me that everyone LOVED them!

Tuesday, April 9, 2013

Back from Spring Break! We were away the last two weeks of March and spent the most glorious Spring Break ever as a family of 5. I am still trying to get back into our family routine now that we are home. We spent 7 days in Cancun, Mexico at the very family friendly all-inclusive resort, Crown Paradise Club Cancun. We read some mixed reviews from Tripadvisor.ca before leaving and made the decision to have fun, no matter what. We lowered our expectations of the resort and raised our expectations to have the best time as a family. With this new outlook, we had an AMAZING time!

We had our belated Easter over the weekend. For dessert, I thought it would be nice to have a Spring/Easter themed carrot cupcakes with cream cheese frosting.

Used a combination of soy milk and lemon juice (didn't have soy yogurt)

Reduced the liquid amounts to reflect the decrease in sugar content

Reduced the confectioner's sugar in the cream cheese frosting

For the vegan "Cream Cheese" Frosting, I used Tofutti brand soy cream cheese. I didn't like the frosting at all when freshly made. It was way too sweet for my liking. I gave it another chance by letting the cupcakes sit in the fridge overnight for the flavours to develop. Because I cut down the icing sugar (confectioner's sugar), the frosting was very soft. Too soft to pipe, so I simply spooned it on each cupcake.

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About Me

I am a Chinese-Canadian mom born in Vancouver, Canada. My husband and I have 3 beautiful children under the age of 10. As of September 2014, we moved from rural 100 Mile House, BC to Kamloops, BC! Many adventures ahead for our family! Life is too short, hence this blog is to jot down our family recipes for our children to access when they are older.